Previously Developed Plot Questions Checklist

Write down every use of the plot you know or have been told about, with dates where you have them, and mark which you have evidence for.

A specialist treats a sourced account differently from an unsourced one, and only the person who heard them can separate the two.

Ask what was demolished on the plot, roughly when, and whether the foundations or floors of anything are understood to still be there.

What was left in the ground is frequently a separate question from what was taken away, and both get asked later.

Ask whether the ground was ever filled, levelled, tipped on or raised, and pass on anything you hear rather than judging what it means.

Made ground changes what an investigation looks for, and an owner's local knowledge is often the first indication any exists.

Nothing about made ground or what it contains can be settled from what you have been told. It has to be established by a qualified specialist.

Ask whether any tank, fuel store, pit or underground structure was ever present, and where each of those is understood to have been.

These are the features most likely to still be there and least likely to appear on any drawing.

Ask whether the land or anything near it was quarried, mined or worked, and note who told you and in what terms.

This shapes which specialist is needed and is much easier to raise at the start than to discover partway through design.

Write down the periods you have not been able to account for at all, since gaps in a history are themselves useful information.

A specialist reading your notes wants to know what is unknown as much as what is known, and owners rarely record it.

Collect old maps covering the plot from as many different decades as you can find, and keep a note of where each came from.

Comparing editions across decades is what reveals a structure or a use that nobody now remembers.

Look for aerial images of the plot from different periods, and note anything visible in an older image that is not visible now.

Aerial images frequently show yards, tracks and structures that maps omitted, and they are easy for an owner to gather.

Ask your local authority what record they hold of earlier applications, decisions or conditions affecting the plot, and record who told you and when.

Conditions attached to an old decision can still be live, and they occasionally control matters an owner would never think to ask about.

Only your local authority can confirm what applies to your plot. Nothing on this page determines any designation, condition or requirement.

Look for local history material, old photographs or published accounts covering the area, and note anything that refers to the plot or its neighbours.

Local collections hold material about ordinary sites that no official record contains, and it is free to look.

Ask the seller, the agent or a previous owner whether any ground investigation or environmental report was ever produced, and whether a copy still exists.

Earlier reports frequently exist and are simply not handed on, and asking costs nothing while the answer is still easy to get.

Keep a record of where you looked and what you did not find, not only of what you did, since the absence is part of the picture.

A specialist can tell a lot from knowing which sources were already checked, and it saves duplicated effort.

Ask long-standing neighbours what they remember about the plot, note their answers with the date, and thank them rather than pressing further.

The question is worth putting while the people who remember are still willing to talk, and that window is finite.

Ask the seller or previous owner directly what they know about earlier uses, and record their answer as their account rather than as fact.

Recording the source rather than the conclusion is what makes an account useful to a professional later.

Anything you hear about former uses or made ground should be passed to a qualified professional to assess rather than acted on.

Ask what used to be delivered to or taken from the plot, since a pattern of traffic frequently tells more than a description of the building does.

People remember lorries and smells far better than they remember what a business was called.

Ask whether anyone remembers water standing on or running across the plot, and where it came from and went.

This is the kind of thing local memory holds precisely and documents do not, and it is directly useful.

Ask each person you speak to who else would remember, and follow that up rather than treating each conversation as complete in itself.

One name usually leads to a better one, and the most useful account is often two conversations away.

Write each conversation down the same day with the name and date, since recollections blur quickly once several people have been asked.

Notes written later merge accounts together, which is exactly the thing that makes them unusable to a specialist.

Walk the plot slowly with a camera and note anything that looks out of place, including changes in surface, vegetation or level.

Owners can do this repeatedly and in different conditions, which no single professional visit can reproduce.

Note any hardstanding, concrete, tarmac or unusual surface and roughly where it sits, since these commonly mark earlier structures or yards.

Surfaces are the most durable evidence of a previous use and the first thing to be removed during clearance.

Note where vegetation grows differently across the plot, and photograph those areas as an observation to hand over without drawing any conclusion about why.

This is a classic indicator that a specialist will want to see, and an owner is well placed to spot it over time.

Write down everything visible above ground, including covers, meter boxes, poles, marker posts and inspection chambers, with a rough note of each position.

This is often the first question a designer asks and the one owners are least prepared for, though the evidence is in plain sight.

Note any brick, ash, glass, slag or other debris visible in the surface soil, and photograph it in place rather than collecting it.

Where something is found matters as much as what it is, and photographing it in position preserves both.

Do not dig, sample or handle unknown material found on a plot. What it is and what it means are for a qualified specialist to establish.

Record any structure, wall, base or retaining feature still standing, and note what each appears to be made of and what condition it looks to be in.

Existing features carry information about the plot's past and are routinely cleared before anyone examines them.

Ask what investigation has ever been carried out on the plot, who commissioned it, and whether the full report still exists rather than a summary.

Summaries circulate long after the report itself is lost, and they are frequently quoted well beyond their scope.

Ask what an existing report was commissioned to cover and what it was not, and put that question to a qualified professional rather than reading it yourself.

Reports get quoted beyond their scope on almost every project, and the boundary is not obvious to a non-specialist.

Interpreting a ground investigation report is a professional matter. Put any report you hold to a suitably qualified professional.

Ask who is entitled to rely on an existing report, and what would be involved in extending that to you, a lender or a warranty provider.

Reliance is a formal matter rather than a courtesy, and it is far easier to arrange while the author is still contactable.

Ask whether an older report would still be accepted by the parties who need to see it, and who makes that judgement.

This is decided by the people relying on it rather than by the document, and knowing who decides is the useful part.

Ask what further investigation an existing report implies is needed, since many reports recommend work that was never carried out.

The recommendations at the back of a report are the part most commonly left undone and most commonly asked about later.

Keep the whole document rather than an extract, including its appendices, since the parts people discard are the parts specialists read.

Appendices carry the data, and a report circulating without them is close to useless to anyone assessing it.

Ask what the plot's history changes about how the building would be founded, and treat the answer as a question to be resolved by investigation.

This is the single question a history most often affects, and it is better asked early than discovered during design.

Ask whether the plot's history means a ground gas assessment should be considered, which professional would advise on that, and at what point it should happen.

Previous use is exactly the trigger for that question, and owners rarely connect the two without prompting.

Ask what the history changes about drainage and where water is allowed to go, and confirm with the relevant undertaking.

Made ground and previous surfacing both affect this, and the answer comes from parties outside the design team.

Ask what might still be in the ground and who would establish it before anything is excavated, rather than relying on the plot looking clear.

A cleared plot and an empty one are different things, and only investigation separates them.

Anything unexpected uncovered during excavation should be left undisturbed until a suitably qualified professional has looked at it.

Ask how the history affects the order in which things have to be established, since some investigation has to precede design rather than follow it.

Sequence is the practical consequence owners feel most, and it is easily missed until a design is already under way.

Ask whether a lender, insurer or warranty provider would want to see anything about the plot's history, and in what form.

Third parties with their own document requirements are much easier to satisfy before design than after.

Decide which of your records belong to the property rather than to you, and mark them so whoever assembles the handover documents knows.

Records that travel with a household instead of a building are lost at the first sale.

Write a short plain-language account of what the plot was and what was done about it, and keep it in front of the documents.

A future owner or surveyor reads the narrative first, and a folder with no narrative is much harder to use.

Keep any investigation report together with whatever design it led to, since each is much less useful without the other.

Separating these is how a complete record becomes an unusable one, and it happens by accident at handover.

Record anything found in the ground during the work, with photographs, dates and a note of what was decided about it.

Discoveries during construction are the part of a plot's history nobody writes down and everybody later asks about.

Note anything that was found and deliberately left in place, and make sure that decision and its reasons are written down clearly.

Something left in the ground on purpose is a fact a future owner needs, and it survives only as a written note.

Ask your professionals what a future owner would need to be told about this plot, and make sure that is written somewhere plain.

Framing the question that way produces a far more useful document than asking for a handover pack.